Category Archives: US News

Record number of manatees die in Florida as food source dries up

Posted on by

State officials report ‘unprecedented’ deaths due to starvation as pollution and algal blooms take toll

More manatees have died already this year than in any other year in Florida’s recorded history, primarily from starvation due to the loss of seagrass beds, state officials have said.

The Florida Fish & Wildlife Conservation Commission reported that 841 manatee deaths were recorded between 1 January and 2 July, breaking the previous record of 830 that died during the whole of 2013 because of an outbreak of toxic red tide.

Continue reading...

Biden’s clean energy plan would cut emissions and save 317,000 lives

Posted on by

A new report has found that a policy standard would be most effective to reach the goal of 80% renewable energy use by 2030

A Biden administration plan to force the rapid uptake of renewable energy would swiftly cut planet-heating emissions and save hundreds of thousands of lives from deadly air pollution, a new report has found amid growing pressure on the White House to deliver a major blow against the climate crisis.

Of various climate policy options available to the new administration, a clean energy standard would provide the largest net benefits to the US, according to the report, in terms of costs as well as lives saved.

Continue reading...

Firefighters struggle to contain exploding northern California wildfire

Posted on by

Blaze rushes north-east from the Sierra Nevada forest region after doubling in size as heatwave blankets US west

Firefighters struggled to contain an exploding northern California wildfire under blazing temperatures as another heatwave blanketed the west, prompting an excessive heat warning for inland and desert areas.

Death Valley in south-eastern California’s Mojave Desert reached 128 F (53C) on Saturday, according to the National Weather Service’s reading at Furnace creek. The shockingly high temperature was actually lower than the previous day, when the location reached 130F (54C).

Continue reading...

Texas Republicans advance voting restrictions at special session after Democrat walkout

Posted on by

Texans from across the ideological spectrum flocked to testify in person at public hearings convened by governor Greg Abbott

Hailee Mouch woke up at 2am Saturday morning so she could drive to her state’s capital city of Austin and testify at two competing public hearings on Texas’s restrictive voting bills.

She knew she had to return to the Dallas area to be at work by 6am Sunday. But she was determined to stay as long as possible to tell state lawmakers how their proposals would hurt democracy in the small city where she goes to college.

Continue reading...

Death toll rises to 90 in Miami condo collapse as search for victims continues

Posted on by
  • Some 31 people remain listed as missing
  • Team of first responders from Israel departs

Authorities searching for victims of a deadly condo collapse in Florida said Sunday they hope to conclude their painstaking work in the coming weeks as a team of first responders from Israel departed the site.

The Miami-Dade county mayor, Daniella Levine Cava, said 90 deaths have now been confirmed in last month’s collapse of the 12-story Champlain Towers South in Surfside, up from 86 a day before. Among them are 71 bodies that have been identified, and their families have been notified, she said. Some 31 people remain listed as missing.

Continue reading...

Fauci says no immediate need for Covid booster for fully vaccinated Americans

Posted on by

Biden chief medical adviser says guidance may change in future as Pfizer suggests booster ‘may be beneficial’ after six months

Dr Anthony Fauci has said there is no immediate need for a Covid-19 booster for fully vaccinated Americans but remained open to the possibility in the future, as reports suggest that one major pharmaceutical company plans to lobby government officials to approve booster shots next week.

Pharmaceutical company Pfizer announced last week that it had observed that its vaccine, while effective against the virus, had “a decline in efficacy against symptomatic disease over time”. The company suggested that as new variants continue to emerge a booster shot after six months “may be beneficial”.

Continue reading...

Jovenel Moïse obituary

Posted on by
Haitian president whose five-year rule was mired in allegations of corruption and brutality

The five-year rule of the Haitian president Jovenel Moïse, who has died aged 53 after being assassinated at his home, was dominated by allegations of corruption and brutality. At the time of his death there was a dispute about the handover of power, and Moïse, who last year had dissolved the country’s parliament, was essentially running Haiti by decree, much as Napoleon had done more than 200 years before.

In 2016, Moïse inherited a country still trying to recover from the 2010 devastating earthquake as well as Hurricane Matthew, which had hit just a month before. However, under his presidency, Haitians endured worsening living standards, including rampant unemployment, in a nation where more than half the population live below the poverty line. Inflation spiralled upwards and food and fuel became scarcer.

Continue reading...

US records rising number of drownings in lakes, rivers and backyard pools

Posted on by

• 2020 already a more deadly year on lakes than 2019

• Heatwaves and swimming lesson hiatus among factors

Rising numbers of drownings are being reported in lakes, rivers, backyard pools and other bodies of inland water across the US this summer, amid factors such as early season severe heatwaves and children having missed out on swimming lessons during the pandemic.

Almost three dozen drownings have been reported in the Great Lakes alone in the year up to the Fourth of July holiday weekend, at least 34 compared with 25 in the same period of 2020, according to statistics gathered by the Great Lakes Surf Rescue Project, a non-profit safety organization.

Continue reading...

Oliver Stone derided for film about ‘modest’ former Kazakh president

Posted on by

Eight-hour series about Nursultan Nazarbayev criticised for stoking cult of personality of 30-year ruler

Oliver Stone has interviewed Kazakhstan’s former president Nursultan Nazarbayev for a new eight-hour film series which has been attacked as a hagiography that contributes to the leader’s cult of personality.

In the film, Qazaq: History of the Golden Man, Stone employs the same non-confrontational approach to interviewing autocrats that has made him a favourite of Vladimir Putin, Ukraine’s former president Viktor Yanukovych and others seeking to polish their reputations by sitting down with the Oscar-winning director of Platoon and JFK.

Continue reading...

More sex. Fewer fights. Has the pandemic actually been good for relationships?

Posted on by

A poll finds American adults are happy with their partnerships, perhaps because lockdown has pushed couples to grow

From the earliest days of the pandemic, experts anticipated that the stress of Covid-19 would wreak havoc on romantic relationships (and in some cases, they were right). But one recent survey suggests what few people could have predicted: for many of the couples that persevered, the pandemic may have actually improved the relationship.

According to a national poll released in February by Monmouth University, a whopping 70% of romantically committed American adults are “extremely satisfied” in their relationships. This figure marks a more than 11-point increase over previous installations of the survey, which the university has conducted for more than six years.

Continue reading...

Kamala Harris faces scrutiny and tests in first six months as vice-president

Posted on by

The vice-president was handed what some saw as a poisoned chalice of leading the southern border response and faces ‘unique hurdles’ in the administration

Kamala Harris looked glad to be back at her alma mater, Howard University in Washington. “The first office I ever ran for was probably the most difficult campaign I’ve ever been in,” she recalled with laughter, “and that was freshman class representative of what was then called the liberal arts student council.”

Related: How Trump’s big lie has been weaponized since the Capitol attack

Continue reading...

Virgin Galactic to launch space plane with Richard Branson on board

Posted on by

The billionaire, along with two pilots and three other passengers, will reach 55 miles above Earth for about an hour

British entrepreneur Richard Branson is set to fly to the edge of space in his Virgin Galactic passenger rocket plane on Sunday, days ahead of a rival launch by Amazon founder Jeff Bezos, as the two billionaires race to kick off an era of space tourism.

Branson’s extraterrestrial venture Virgin Galactic will send its space plane into sub-orbital flight on Sunday morning, aimed at reaching 55 miles above Earth at its peak altitude.

Continue reading...

Charlottesville removes Confederate statues at center of deadly 2017 protest – video

Posted on by

Statues of Confederate generals Robert E Lee and Thomas 'Stonewall' Jackson were taken down in the city of Charlottesville, Virginia, on Saturday, nearly four years after white supremacist protests over plans to remove them led to clashes in which a woman was run down by a car and killed. A small crowd of onlookers cheered as the statue of Lee was hoisted away first, lifted by crane from its stone pedestal and taken away on a flat-bed truck.

Continue reading...

Doubts raised about who was behind the assassination of Haiti’s president

Posted on by

Police claims that Jovenel Moïse was killed by a mainly Colombian hit squad thrown into doubt

Questions have been raised over Haiti’s official narrative for the assassination of its president, Jovenel Moïse, who was gunned down at his mansion in Port-au-Prince last Wednesday.

Haitian police and the politicians who stepped into the political vacuum created by Moïse’s killing have claimed he was shot at about 1am by members of a predominantly Colombian hit squad who had stormed the president’s hillside residence. “Foreigners came to our country to kill the president,” police chief Léon Charles alleged after the shooting.

Continue reading...

California: strong winds form fire tornado during Tennant fire – video

Posted on by

Newly released footage of the Tennant fire in California filmed on 29 June shows a fire tornado near the Klamath national forest. Large wildfires can heat air so much that huge clouds develop. In strong winds, these can rotate and sometimes produce a tornado, or fire whirl. California’s wildfire season is already more extreme than in 2020. Officials say the length of fire season has increased by 75 days across the Sierras, in keeping with a rise in the extent of forest fires statewide.

Continue reading...

Biden balancing act with the left put to the test as he pushes key legislation

Posted on by
  • Democratic progressives urge Biden to go big on infrastructure
  • Regular meetings with left but moderates remain powerful

It is one of the most delicate balancing acts in American politics: how to keep together a Democratic party whose lawmakers range from the democratic socialism of the New York congresswoman Alexandra Ocasio-Cortez to the staunch conservatism of the West Virginia senator Joe Manchin.

But as Joe Biden’s administration has pushed both parts of his ambitious infrastructure plan through Congress, top Democratic officials and aides have made a point of working hard to keep the fractious sects of the party on Capitol Hill in check.

Continue reading...

Vancouver judge’s decision over Huawei finance chief may deepen US-China row

Posted on by

Judge refuses to admit new evidence that might have helped Meng Wanzhou avoid extradition to US

The prospect of a deepening diplomatic row between the US and China has grown after a Canadian judge refused to admit new evidence that might have helped the Huawei chief financial officer, Meng Wanzhou, avoid extradition to the US.

The arrest of Meng, the daughter of the Chinese telecommunication company’s billionaire founder, has prompted a sharp deterioration in relations between Canada, the US and China. Soon after Meng’s detention in Vancouver in December 2018, China arrested two Canadians in China: Michael Spavor and Michael Kovrig.

Continue reading...

FinTok: how TikTok is helping young people use cash wisely

Posted on by

It’s not just jokes and emojis – the video-sharing platform can help users learn how to manage money

Sea shanties and viral dance trends have helped make TikTok a hit since the start of the pandemic. In 2020, the social media app, which allows users to create and share one or more 60-second films soundtracked with music clips, surpassed 2bn global downloads.

In the financial world, TikTok has a reputation for promoting volatile cryptocurrencies and activist investing – interest in Dogecoin and GameStop has been fuelled by the platform. But, beyond the jokes and rocket emojis being shared by some users, there is a wealth of practical personal finance videos that are teaching young people how to use their money better.

Continue reading...

Data, not arms, the key driver in emerging US-China cold war | Robert Reich

Posted on by

Cybersecurity comes down to which side has access to more information about the other and can utilize it best

This week, shares in China’s giant ride-hailing app Didi crashed by more than 20%. A few days before, Didi had raised $4.4bn in a massive IPO in New York – the biggest initial public offering by a Chinese company since Alibaba’s debut in 2014.

The proximate cause of Didi’s crash was an announcement by China’s Cyberspace Administration that it suspected Didi of illegally collecting and using personal information. Pending an investigation, it had ordered Didi to stop registering new users and removed Didi’s app from China’s app stores.

Continue reading...

Fox News’ planned 24-hour weather channel has climate experts worried

Posted on by

Climate crisis researchers worry about the channel’s reach to perpetuate misinformation and advance political goals

Fox News Media, the company that owns the reactionary, climate crisis-skeptical Fox News, is launching a weather channel this year – a development that has climate crisis experts worried.

Fox Weather, a 24-hour channel devoted to all things meteorological, promises “cutting-edge display technology”, according to a press release, with “forecasting experts surrounding every major weather event”.

Continue reading...